Church, Charity And Business Leaders Call For Community Energy Revolution

The National Trust, along with a coalition of civil society
leaders from UK organisations with over twelve million members, has
called for community energy to play a substantial role in meeting the
country's climate change targets.

Leading figures from The Co-operative; the National Trust; The National Federation
of Women's Institutes; the Church of England and Campaign to Protect Rural England
will today meet Chris Huhne, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, to
launch their joint 'vision for community energy', which supports dramatically
scaling up the number of community owned renewable energy projects across the
country, and to discuss how the Government can best assist.

The National Trust has been working on its low carbon villages (LCV) project which aims to tackle the disillusionment and helplessness that many
people feel about climate change in two Trust owned villages, Coleshill in
Oxfordshire, and Cambo on the Trust's estate at Wallington, Northumberland. Through
a process of engagement over a three-year period, LCV aimed to develop positive and
practical solutions that could set villagers on a journey to low-carbon living. The
energy projects the charity has undertaken across all of its places as part of its
commitment to generating half of the UK's energy from renewable energy sources by
2020 can be seen on the National Trust energy map, found on the charity's site.

Patrick Begg, Director of Rural Enterprise at The National Trust, commented: "Many
other European countries are way ahead of the UK, as we found out when visiting
German communities last year. Germany produces over 20 per cent of its electricity
from renewable sources, with communities generating about a quarter of this. In the
UK, less than 1 per cent is generated by our communities, a figure this coalition
wants to dramatically increase by 2020. We are asking the Government to support us
in this."

At the same time, local energy schemes will receive another boost today as The
Co-operative launches its Community Energy Challenge, a competition which will
result in six communities across the UK receiving support to set up their own energy
projects. The Co-operative is setting aside £1 million in 2012 to support community
energy. This will involve everything from mentoring for start-ups through to the
underwriting of co-operative share offers in local co-operatives.

Paul Monaghan, Head of Social Goals at The Co-operative, said: "We want nothing
less than a clean energy revolution, with communities controlling and benefiting
from their own renewable energy. Talk of a new dash for gas shales, which could see
up to 3,000 wells installed across the UK, highlights the choices we face - more and
dirtier sources of fossil fuels or clean energy owned and controlled by
communities."

In the coming months and years, the coalition, who were brought together by The
Co-operative and its partners, sustainable development organisations Forum for the
Future and Carbon Leapfrog, collectively plan to meet at regular intervals to make
practical steps to drive the shared vision forwards and champion community energy
among their members. Late last year coalition representatives visited Germany to see
examples of other successful community schemes.

ENDS

About The National Trust:
The National Trust cares for over 300 of England, Wales and Northern Ireland's
greatest historic houses and gardens, 1,000 km of coastline and vast swathes of our
most beautiful countryside. People of all ages - individuals, schools and
communities - get involved each year with our projects, events and working holidays
and over 60,000 volunteers help to bring the properties alive for the Trust's 4
million members and many more million visitors. Those interested in volunteering in
the UK can find out more
at: www.nationaltrust.org.uk.
PR Contact:
Mike Collins
The National Trust
Senior Press Officer
The National Trust
Heelis
Kemble Drive
Swindon
SN2 2NA
01793 817708 www.nationaltrust.org.uk